Tims Ford Crappie - anyone want to fish with me and show me some ropes ?

[donberry]

Hello, I was wondering if any of you crappie pros (anyone who likes to crappie fish on Tims and has any level of success will do.) would like to go on a fishing trip with me and maybe show me the ropes a little on crappie fishing at Tims Ford. Was actually more interested in open water crappie. I grew up fishing docks, so while not a pro by any means, am pretty familiar with hitting the docks.
Just recently started fishing again after a LONG hiatus (decades really) My brother was (still is) always the great fisherman so I always just did what he was doing to catch fish. Love crappie fishing, is my favorite. Alas he lives in Florida (is a charter captain of his own boat now actually) so I have discovered I learned very little by emulating him as we always fished in lakes more similar to Woods, never anything like Tims.
Recently got a new to me boat, a 1988 Dynasty 190 Fish and Ski with a 4.3l OMC in it. She isn't the prettiest but she runs good now and it floats, knock on wood).
Trolling motor on it isn't great, but it does work (shaft needs to be longer and the foot control can get kind of hard to move around. I will be working on that tho. Works okay now tho it isn't the "smoothest" trolling motor ride in town. I end up basically jerking it all over the place. I will practice tho.
Just got a new Lowrance HDS-5 a few days ago. I am still trying to learn how to read the sonar, but the maps are helping tremendously as at least I don't get lost out there any more. Is nice to actually know where I am going now and not having to worry about finding the boat dock when I am done.
I put a Bass pro anchor winch on it - wish it had a free fall release as it can take a while to drop anchor, but it is nice pulling up anchor.

At the moment I am using 3 spinning reels. Not sure if I have the right jigs for crappie here, but I should be able to use my own tackle. If anything, I won't catch as many but I will know what I need to buy. I am pretty sure I have something that should work okay.
I can provide free coke, beer if you like (I am a coke drinker myself), water or whatever.

You will probably cuss out my trolling motor driving more then anything else (or you can run it )
My ff is mounted in the driver's area. I do have another for the trolling motor, a Humminbird matrix 17, but it is not mounted yet.
Hmmmmm - if you want to do it at night, I have UV lights on the boat. White light is a little lacking so I would recommend you bring a flashlight head lamp (my other lights just crappied out on me last night).

Up to you, if you like I have a stereo on board to listen to music.....
Is plenty of room in the boat for 2 people - has a fishing chair up front at the trolling motor and another one that can be placed up on the back engine cover (I just normally stand if I fish that area). If need be, I am sure we could fish 3 in it fairly comfortably (maybe your wife or son/daughter wants to go)

I normally launch at Pleasant Grove, but am obviously willing to launch anywhere - or I could even pick you up in the boat.
I normally don't eat much in the boat, but will gladly get you some food if you want.

I wouldn't mind being able to mark a few holes with the gps if possible. One thing I can promise is I would never tell anyone else about them. I always pretty much fish by myself anyway.
I wouldn't even mind just driving around with you showing me stuff on my sonar. I can read bottom structure of course, but I am not really finding a whole lot to be honest with you (I did find one place today that I am going to go back and give a shot). I just got it so am going to be going out just trying to learn to read it better/faster.

I pretty much always watch my grandkids (I am 52) on Mon, Tues, Wed so couldn't go out until around 5:00 on those days, if night fishing, would need to be back by midnight as I have to get up early.
The rest of the days - I can go anytime. I personally like Thurs and Friday during the day as there is less traffic, but I understand most people have to work for a living, so weekends are just fine.

It is preferable that you don't mind if I smoke cigarettes on the boat. I could go without, but we may have to take some smoke breaks here and there.

whew - now you know just about all there is to know about me and my boat - oh, one more thing. While my daughter is a Volunteer and went to UT, I am a Buckeye, hopefully you won't hold that against me. She named one of my dogs smoky if that helps.

Now that you know just about everything there is to know - would anyone be interested in going on a fishing trip with me and maybe either take me to a honey hole or 2 that I would never , ever disclose, or even just drive around and you could show me how you search for them.

If anyone is actually interested after reading all of this, shoot me a pm and i will get back to you. I think it best I not put my email address here as I get enough spam....
thanks
Don Berry
(wouldn't break my heart if you taught me how to fish for rockfish instead, tho I do love crappie when you find the honey holes)

[The Shootist]

Hello Don, The Middle Tennesse Crappie Club had a tournament on Tims yesterday.We had 9 boats .Had 1 boat with 10 fish,1 with 9 fish and 1 with 8 fish and the rest had 3 to 5 fish so it is rough on Tims right now..If you are putting in at pleasant grove there is some good deeper brush in there on left bank goin g out.look for anything in around 18 feet of water and drop a Bobby Garland or a minnow.Go to Middle Tennessee Crappie Club.com and check out the results.

[donberry]

thanks for the reply. Just ordered a bunch of the Bobby Garland's and a few others, should be here just in time for next week's fishing.
I appreciate the info - thanks.

[The Shootist]

I just saw that this is your first time posting.Welcome to the most informative site for crappie fishing on the web.Just keep in mind if you start catching stripe where you think the crappie are just fisha little deeper.Thats what worked for us yesterday.

[c1bigocarp]

Don,

Welcome aboard. you sound like the perfect candidate to join our club. We fish Tims, Normandy and Woods and are all about sharing our experience with other members. Check out the website Middle Tennessee Crappie Club for more information on the club. Our next meeting will be at Tims Ford State park at 530 pm and we will be having a fish fry and you are more than welcome to attend. Dock shooting is what most people do on Tims but changed the tactics last Saturday with great success. I caught 4 keepers in a fallen tree and 16 keepers on a drop off with stumps in 18 FOW using assasins. Checking out the lake in the winter when the water is low is the key to finding these spots. We always have people looking for partners in these tournaments.

Randy

[crappieseeker]

all I used for the msot part when I fished Tims was assassins, and I assassinated some crappie at times. c1big. I now make some baits similar to the assassin, pm me your address and I will try and get some samples your way when I get a chance. Any particular color you like?

[donberry]

Middle Tennessee Crappie Club - May be a few weeks as I am kind of tied up on Thursday and headed down to Cape Coral the following week for some deep sea fishing - my brother has a nice boat and is a charter captain.

Free samples - super generous of you, sort of feel like I would be taking advantage of you tho. I had a $25.00 Bass Pro gift card that I have had for a long time, so I ordered some of the Garland and assassins. I gather you will be selling them ? If so, let me know when and I may buy some off of you.

[crappieseeker]

donberry, I do not have a business but I do sell some to a few people on the board from time to time. I just sold some on the classifieds yesterday I think it was. Go to the personal classified adds and scroll down til you see the post titled "2 inch soft plastics" there are some pictures there.

[donberry]

I will check that out shortly.
My other hobby is listening to music and I have accumulated a lot of gear looking for the perfect pieces to build my main system. I am really happy with where it is at so decided to sell off a few things I have sitting around. Point is, someone in Nashville wanted to buy a couple pair of speakers, so instead of making him drive all the way to Tullahoma, I met him in Murfreesboro - at Dicks Sporting Goods.
Took care of the speakers and then went in and bought a WHOLE bunch of bags of the Bobby Garland and Panfish Assassins. One of every color and numerous bags of certain colors (black shad etc).
My daughter in laws parents are coming into town this weekend and we are going out to Woods. I am renting a pontoon boat for our "base camp" and then they are also renting skis and will ski out of my boat (it is a Fish and Ski after all).
Supposed to meet them at 10:30, so I am going to head out around 4:30 or so and do some crappie fishing until then. I am actually pretty excited because Woods is a lot more like the reservoirs/lakes I grew up fishing on. Maybe a little deeper,they were around 35 feet deep, but structure wise etc is what I am used to where on Tims, besides shooting the docks, I am lost.
So while I may find out I have forgotten everything my brother ever did, I have a good feeling that I am going to get on a few crappie in the morning.
If you happen to be out there fishing tomorrow (saturday), I will apologize up front for the boat zooming all over the lake, probably in total disregard for the fishermen. But I will be on the pontoon boat since I am the only one allowed to rent stuff so my father in law will probably be the one driving my boat and something tells me he is not the most considerate person in the world when it comes to others.
Hopefully I am wrong.

[crappieseeker]

I use to catch a lot of crappie on Woods. I only know of 3 or 4 places but I have caught a few fish in atleast one of the areas every time I fished there.